Lakeshore Baseball Club looks to expand its operations to Muskegon's Campbell Field

Chronicle file photoMudskipper's Andrew Bard, right, dodges the tag at first from Riptide's Andrew Bosma, left, during a summer league baseball game at Marsh Field last July.

MUSKEGON — The baseball organization that is bringing back some of the old glory of Marsh Field needs more access to baseball diamonds.

The Lakeshore Baseball Club LLC signed an agreement with the city of Muskegon last year to operate and maintain historic Marsh Field at the corner of Laketon Avenue and Peck Street. The group will enter into a similar agreement for one of the four ballfields at the city's Campbell Field at Barclay Street and Young Avenue.

Muskegon city commissioners gave the green light for the Lakeshore Baseball Club to use the largest baseball field at Campbell for its middle-school-aged leagues that run in April and May. Campbell also has three other diamonds for the West Little League and youth softball leagues, along with an area for T-ball.

“We are basically running out of fields, and I guess that is a good problem to have,” said Lakeshore Baseball's Jim Grevel.

Marsh Field was built in 1916 and had been showing its age when Lakeshore Baseball stepped in last year. In its glory years through the 1940s, baseball Hall of Famers Charley Gehringer, Mickey Cochrane, Harry Heilmann, Johnny Mize and Satchel Paige were among the starts to take the field at Marsh.

After Lakeshore Baseball's first year at Marsh Field, “it is going very, very well,” Grevel said.

Marsh Field is sized for high school-aged teams that come from all over the state and Upper Midwest to compete in Muskegon. Campbell will be able to provide a field for younger players.

Lakeshore Baseball currently has slated a middle school league of more than two dozen teams from Shelby to Grand Haven, Grevel said. The Campbell field would be needed for mainly weekday afternoons and evenings in the spring, he said.

Muskegon commissioners and staff wanted to make sure that the historic use of the field by West Little League would not be impaired.

“We don't have any intention of displacing anyone else but to help improve and maintain the ball field,” Grevel said.

West Little League's Bob Richardson said his organization supports Lakeshore Baseball's move into the larger field at Campbell. He said West Little League does not use that particular field a lot, but has leagues on it in June through early July.

“We should be able to work hand-in-hand with the guys,” Richardson said of Lakeshore Baseball.

Lakeshore Baseball includes Grevel; Pete Gawkowski, who is a Subway Sandwich Shop owner in Muskegon and has the baseball training facility Extra Innings; and Len Piasecki, who heads the Muskegon ChannelCats travel youth baseball club.